“The Time
of Their Lives” in our April issue featured excerpts from the diary of
Betty, who, along with her husband Scott, 13-year-old daughter Kate, and
Kate’s teacher Michelle, set off on a remarkable 10-month exploration
aboard the 109-foot charter yacht Askari beginning last summer.
(Kate, with Michelle’s help, regularly sent e-mail updates home to her
fellow students to educate them about the locales they were visiting.)
When we last touched base with them and Askari’s seven-person crew,
they had just arrived in the South Pacific. Here we present more of Betty’s
diary.

NOVEMBER 2002, MOOREA
Well it’s Thanksgiving Day! This is kinda an odd one—compared to the way
we usually spend Thanksgiving.

Instead of driving 200
miles up I-35 to Gramma’s house, we rode for about 10 minutes in the dinghy
to the nearest coral reef. Instead of meeting up with family and old friends,
we met up with a moray eel, several triggerfish, a couple dozen lion fish,
and four eagle rays.

Instead of sitting down
in front of the TV to watch football, we attended the local Polynesian
dance show (complete with fire!).

And instead of perusing
the local newspaper for the pre-Christmas sale ads, we were watching an
awesome array of colors as the sun set behind the hills in Moorea.

But some things were
very much the same...

At 6:00 p.m., we sat
down with friends and family at a large table. We held hands and gave
thanks.

I have always had a
lot to be thankful for—but never so much as this year. I am thankful for
my health. I am thankful that there are so many wonderful places in this
world and that I have had a chance to see some of them. I am thankful
for my family, because without them, even paradise wouldn’t be fun. And
I am thankful for my friends.

Then we all stuffed
ourselves with turkey, mashed potatoes, green bean casserole (with the
fried onions on top) and cranberry sauce. We followed that with pumpkin
pie, cherry pie, pecan pie, and loads of whipped cream!

Yum!

Happy Thanksgiving.

DECEMBER 2002, NEAR
TAHITI
We spent the day on Taha’a, a small island about 150 miles from Tahiti.
Taha’a is known as the vanilla island and produces about 70 percent of
the vanilla in Polynesia. The locals call vanilla “black gold” because
the bean is black when dried and they make a lot of money exporting vanilla.

We anchored in Huameme
Bay at about 8:15 this morning and could see Patio, the main town in Taha’a.
By 9:00 a.m. we were ashore and met up with a local, Alein, for a tour
of the island.